Despondent man fuels Dracut standoff drama

DRACUT -- Police took a 52-year-old man into custody for a mental-health evaluation after he reportedly threatened suicide and turned on all the natural gas in his Lakeview Avenue home Thursday afternoon, drawing two SWAT teams and police from across the region to the area.

According to Dracut police, the man stepped out onto his porch at 4:01 p.m., about an hour and a half after the department received a 911 call from a woman who said her intoxicated roommate had attempted suicide because he was despondent over issues with his ex-wife.

Police did not release the man's name.

Janice Tremblay said she's known the suspect for 11 years.

Local and state police, as well as two SWAT teams, wait to approach a reportedly suicidal man inside a Lakeview Avenue home in Dracut Thursday afternoon, as an unidentified crisis negotiator tries to talk the man out using a bullhorn. The man was subdued with a stun gun as he left the home because he did not follow police instructions, authorities said. See video and a slide show on this story at lowellsun.com. SUN photos/ David H. Brow

They've been living together as roommates since September on Lakeview Avenue. She said after a fight with his son, her friend began crying. Tremblay said she held the man to comfort him for 45 minutes. She said he then "snapped," and grabbed a knife and slashed himself across the throat.

"He's like a big brother to me," she said. "I wrestled the knife away from him and he cut his hand really bad."

"I'm very worried that he's dead already because he's trying to kill himself," she said through tears outside the home as the drama unfolded.

As Tremblay told her story to bystanders, a SWAT team from the North Eastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council suited up around her and headed toward the house.

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K-9 dogs were on scene and some officers crouched behind their vehicles, guns drawn.

Tremblay asked one of the officers about his weapon, and whether he might shoot her roommate.

"(My friend) yelled, 'I've got a gun," Tremblay said, adding that to her knowledge, her roommate was not armed. "He wouldn't know what to do with one if he had one."

When police responded, they were told the man said he had a gun and wanted to die.

Dracut police and firefighters block off a section of Lakeview Avenue during Thursday's standoff. SUN PHOTOS / David H. Brow

The roommate also indicated during the 911 call that the man had been consuming alcohol and drugs and was intoxicated, according to police. They noticed "a strong odor of natural gas coming from the home," Dracut Deputy Police Chief David Chartrand said in a statement.

Police established a perimeter and evacuated the area, and National Grid workers were brought in to shut off the gas line. The responding officers tried to make contact with the man and have him leave the house. However, "he refused and reiterated his desire to commit suicide," police said in a press release issued Thursday night.

Swat teams from NEMLEC and the Middlesex Sheriff's office responded, as did officers from communities including Lowell, Billerica, Wilmington, Marblehead and Belmont.

Police and SWAT teams take cover and aim behind vehicles during the standoff Thursday.

The SWAT teams surrounded the gray, two-story house and spoke to the man through a megaphone while crowds of neighbors clustered behind police cars and fire trucks.

"Negotiators repeatedly tried to establish a dialogue with the male in order for him to exit the home and receive medical attention for his self-inflicted injuries," Chartrand wrote.

Police said that when the man left his house, he did not follow directions being given by the officers. They used a stun gun on the man and were able to safely take him into custody. Police then searched the home and found no firearms.

No criminal charges are being filed at this time, Chartrand said. The man was taken into custody for an involuntary temporary committal for a mental-health evaluation and transported to Lowell General Hospital.

The man taken into custody is transported by ambulance for a mental-health evaluation.

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